Hollywood Unoriginality Ratio: The Happening
mario June 14th, 2008
I won’t even do the precocious beat-around-the-bush-not-a-review-but-it-actually-is-a-review thing this time. I saw The Happening on June 14th with friends at AMC Saratoga 14, and it sucked. It was the worst movie ever made. Marky Mark played a constantly confused science teacher, but either M. Night Shyamalan doesn’t know what science actually is, or hates it with a passion and is trying to covertly take it down by having dumb scientists in his movies. Zooey Deschanel has insanely creepy giant bug eyes, and stares at anything and everything in the film determinedly. But perhaps the worst offense a film called The Happening can possibly have is for nothing to happen during the entire movie. Oh sure, people die and the main characters run around aimlessly through the countryside, making mad dashes to outrun the scary wind, and hide out in Plot Point House at the end. But the characters never come to any concrete conclusions about what The Happening is supposed to be. The thing simply Happens, and then it stops Happening, and then it Happens again. On the bright side, the hot dog guy was somewhat amusing (he said he likes the shape of hot dogs; presumably it is left up to the viewer to decide what that means).
But yeah, the God-damned worst movie ever made. My friends and I weren’t sure if he could top Lady in the Water but I’m happy(?) to report that this is exactly what Happened.
Um… trailers!
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–The X-Files: I Want to Believe
Oh hells yesses. I miss this friggin’ TV show like I miss no other, so I’m very excited to see the continuing misadventures of Mulder and Scully. I certainly don’t have any complaints about them classing up the joint with Billy Connolly. I gotta say though, Scully (since that is your real name, and not Gillian Anderson like you keep trying to tell me), you look a lot prettier with shorter hair. I’ll still ogle you during the whole movie, don’t worry, I’m just sayin’ is all. A SEQUEL and an ADAPTATION, of course, I won’t delude myself, but I’ll still be happily standing in line. I’m a sucker for beloved franchises.
–Mirrors
Probably because I’m kind of weird, I have a lot of difficulty seeing Kiefer Sutherland onscreen and not thinking he’s Jack Bauer. So when I see him as the father figure in a family being terrorized by mirror monsters, I don’t worry for a second. I know that Jack Bauer will make short work of the mirror monsters, probably by shooting them in the knee and asking them where the bomb is, or simply garroting them if he doesn’t have time to deal with them. Apparently this is a REMAKE of a South Korean film. I don’t really care in any case; Jack Bauer just doesn’t feel very Jack Bauery on the big screen (he rarely even kills one guy, much less fifty, though he did some lovely assisted suicides in Flatliners), so I’ll just wait until the next season of 24 to get my fix.
–Babylon A.D.
Oooooooooooh, Vin Diesel in a sci-fi movie with explosions, punching and guns. Best part: Vin Diesel shouts out “What is wrong with her?”, and the “what” sounds completely ridiculous. I can’t even describe it in text. I’m sure I’ll be watching this at Geoff’s house; the man has something of an unhealthy obsession with Vin Diesel. Oh yeah, ADAPTATION of the French novel “Babylon Babies.” I love how Wikipedia lets me say stuff like that, and it looks like I’m just really knowledgeable when it comes to French novels. None will be the wiser!
–Swing Vote
Hooray. Nothing more timely than a movie about voting ballots not being counted in an extremely close election. OH WAIT, THAT WAS FOUR YEARS AGO. AND EIGHT YEARS AGO. Also, why does this movie have a thousand actors I recognize? I’m normally terrible with actor recognition, but I saw Dr. Conrad Zimsky, Howard Payne, Major Kira and Frasier! Just so you know, if it were up to me, I’d elect Dennis Hopper over Kelsey Grammer, but that’s just because Speed was so awesome. And- wait, what’s this? ORIGINAL?!? A bright shining beacon amidst a sea of all-this-has-happened-before-all-this-will-happen-againses! Well okay, it looks stupid, but that might just be Kevin Costner.
–Nights in Rodanthe
Hey look, that guy from Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Otherwise I don’t give a shit about this ADAPTATION based on the novel of the same name by Richard Sparks (thanks again, Wikipedia!). Is Richard Gere sexy? He seems to be in so many romance films, comedy and otherwise, but I just don’t see the appeal. Maybe people are remembering a time when he was more attractive?
Total: 83.33% (5/6)
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Wow. As of a June 14th screening of The Happening (sucked sucked sucked sucked sucked) at AMC Saratoga 14 in Saratoga, CA, Hollywood was careening toward 83.33% unoriginality. Hollywood, this is basically a fail for you, especially if The Happening is the best you can do for original scripts.
[discuss]